


In Paris With You

by mads_moriarty



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Anal Sex, Angst, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Bottom John, Bottom Sherlock Holmes, Drug Addiction, Drug Use, Fluff and Angst, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Johnlock - Freeform, M/M, Oral Sex, Recreational Drug Use, Top John, Top Sherlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-29
Updated: 2014-04-17
Packaged: 2018-01-17 11:45:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 19,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1386439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mads_moriarty/pseuds/mads_moriarty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock Holmes fell in love with his flatmate and his life has crashed down around him ever since. A few paralytic mistakes and a ferry-ride later, he finds John Watson taking his heart once again. Based off of the poem In Paris With You by James Fenton.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Baker Street

**Author's Note:**

> I made a fanmix for this fic on 8tracks, anyone who wants to give it a listen can go [here.](http://8tracks.com/madismadismad/in-paris-with-you-johnlock)  
> Once again thank you for everybody who has read and given kudos and commented, it all means so much to me!

_Don't talk to me of love. I've had an earful_   
_And I get tearful when I've downed a drink or two._   
_I'm one of your talking wounded._   
_I'm a hostage. I'm maroonded._   
_But I'm in Paris with you._

_Yes I'm angry at the way I've been bamboozled_   
_And resentful at the mess I've been through._   
_I admit I'm on the rebound_   
_And I don't care where are we bound._   
_I'm in Paris with you._

Dusty sunlight streamed through the equally dusty blinds of Sherlock Holmes’ cheap London apartment. The yellow rays shone almost profoundly through half-empty bottles of whisky, vodka, rum; bottles of liquid sleep, ignorance, existence.

Sherlock Holmes was unconscious on a mattress just beneath the windowsill, an amber stain spreading by his left foot where a discarded bottle of Jack Daniels had spewed its lifeblood. He was covered pathetically with a grimy towel and his breathing was ragged, shattered. He breathed in, his breath caught with a thick sound, he breathed out. It went this way for hours, Sherlock sleeping dreamlessly with the sunlight settling on his oily skin.

It was past midday when a soft grunt escaped Sherlock’s nose and he twitched with the motions of waking up. With a resounding stretch, he pulled himself onto all fours and used the windowsill to push himself into a standing position, the wood of the sill warmed palely by the sun. Daggers pulsed through his skull, not sharp daggers but blunt ones, bludgeoning their way through his cerebellum and right through his prefrontal lobe. Sherlock blindly raised his hand to his forehead, perhaps in an attempt to remove the daggers from his head, but stopped halfway and just let the relative coolness of his forearm rest just above his eyes, the fleshy skin cooler than the rest of his body because it had been in the corner of the room, shaded from the intrusive sun’s warmth. Sherlock inwardly promised himself that he’d never drink again, but he knew that it was an empty oath. He knew the way that the alcohol made him forget everything about everything, and it was addictive, it truly was. To forget that he existed was better than having to actually _do it._ Or at least that was how Sherlock had seen it for the past few months, after John.

After John.

 The ragged, curly-haired man, bent uncomfortably over his dusty windowsill, hated himself for thinking about him. John Watson. John Hamish Watson. It hadn’t been a secret that Sherlock Holmes had been completely and totally in love with John Watson since not long after they met, but somehow it had remained unspoken for at least two years whilst they lived together in the same flat. 221B Baker Street, a comfortable enough little place for a doctor who was far too overly-skilled to be a General Practitioner but still seemed content with it, and an unemployed good-for-nothing young man who earned a few quid each week by delivering sandwiches from the shop next door if it wasn’t too long a walk. It was a strange couple that lived in that tiny flat, Sherlock and John, but they worked.

 

It was about 2 weeks in when Sherlock realised he was in love. He’d never really _thought_ about love before, never mind _been_ in it, but he knew that the affection he had for this man was more than just friendship.

Sherlock didn’t believe in destiny but even he had to admit that it seemed like fate the way he and John had met. When Mrs Hudson the landlord had heard that her GP _and_ the fair-faced sandwich delivery boy from next door were _both_ looking for somewhere to live, she couldn’t resist the opportunity to offer her available flat to them. At first it was strange, two men who hardly knew each other in the same apartment, one with a respectable job, one who stayed at home to read mystery novels or play violin. But he sometimes went for walks in the day, delivered sandwiches, and came home with obscure items that ended up on the mantelpiece or bookshelf, like a ceramic skull or some leather-bound volume on 18th century medicine that Sherlock thought John might find interesting. Mostly it was like clockwork: everything moved in perfect synchrony.

And then Sherlock fell in love, which mixed things up significantly.

His apparent inability to mask his feelings, the accidental lack of personal space, the overzealous grins when John did anything and everything: they often meant that people mistook them for partners, and Sherlock got used to John ripping the wings off of the butterflies that rip-roared through his stomach when he replied, ‘I’m not gay!’ and crossed his arms like a child in protest.

All of these people noticed Sherlock’s adoration, but John never suspected a thing, when he was the only one that Sherlock _wanted_ to know, simultaneously the one person Sherlock wished didn’t find out.

And he didn’t, for a while. Until one particular evening in winter, John had crossed and crossed his arms until it had become almost a reflex. Until that one particular evening, John hadn’t said a word.

They were both in the sitting room, under blankets and sporting cups of tea and hardback books with yellowing pages. John had taken a final sip from his mug, closed his book, put it to rest on the arm of his chair, and looked up to face Sherlock. He crossed his leg for what seemed like dramatic effect.

“Do you like me?”

Silence as Sherlock detached himself from his book and looked up without moving his head, glancing through his eyelashes with his hand holding his chin in the way it usually did when he was reading.

“Well, of course I do, John. I put up with you all the ti-“

“No, Sherlock, I mean-“ John hesitated, “do you like me more than that? In a different way?”

Sherlock felt a volcano erupt within him.

 “I don’t- I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Sherlock said meekly, letting his hand fall and avoiding eye contact with the man opposite, trying to control the molten lava that raged in his stomach angrily.

“Jesus, Sherlock,” John muttered, getting up and clenching his fists by his thighs in that way that was supposed to look menacing but always made Sherlock smile.

The smile didn’t come now, as Sherlock noticed the tightness of his muscles, arching away from John, afraid of what was happening.

“You’re making this very bloody difficult for me.” John muttered again, and with that, he took Sherlock’s cheek in his hand, the spot that Sherlock had been holding himself just moments before, and kissed him full on the mouth.

The fire within Sherlock screamed, white hot, burning, so hot that he was afraid to move too much in case the flames brushed against his veins, in case they seared their way through his pulmonary artery to his heart, in case the fire erupted into this kiss and burned John down.

John had sensed Sherlock’s stillness and pulled away, staring uncomfortably at the ground and not knowing exactly what to do.

And then the fire burst from its confines.

Sherlock pulled John back down and forced his mouth back to John’s, liquid flame and passion flowing freely between them both, burning them both, but neither of them caring because they were too focused on the skin, the hair, the touch of the other, the heat between them merely a distraction, irrelevant. John pulled fistfuls of Sherlock’s robe into his hands and Sherlock pulled John fully onto his lap and they kissed, they kissed. Minutes passed by and they kissed. Every touch was electric, it was unbearable, and Sherlock wanted, needed, demanded it: pulling, grabbing, his breath fragmented, unnecessary-

 

-John pulled back, pushing himself away from Sherlock’s pulsing body, running a shaking hand through his hair, open-mouthed and staring. His breathing was gradually stabilising, his shirt wrinkled from Sherlock’s hot grip.

“I’m sorry,” John wheezed, a broken look on his face as he staggered to his bedroom.

 

The suffocating quiet of the flat smothered Sherlock then. His heart took agonising minutes to settle. His lips were numb and he felt red welts in his neck from the whispers of John’s hands.

That night Sherlock went to sleep shivering, the molten rock cooling and stiffening, turning him into a statue, paralysing him. He thought about the way two bodies fit together like they were made to move together from the start. He didn’t know if he wanted to ever move again.


	2. John

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was the next part of Sherlock’s life that he probably should have wished had never happened, but to be perfectly honest with himself, he didn’t believe he had the capacity to feel regret anymore.

The sun was invading Sherlock’s flat so arrogantly that he wanted nothing more than to rip the window away, to turn his flat into four walls with no light to pry into him, to dissect him, to glorify his imperfections. It flooded each corner with a bitter irony, because Sherlock was anything but warm. He was freezing, shivering beneath the closed window, an image of pathetic insecurity, a grown man clutching his arms and only moments away from being a cliché, rocking on the floor and murmuring, letting gritty tears squeeze themselves from his eyes. Sherlock didn’t want that to happen, and stood up before he became too accustomed to the numbing wooden floor beneath him. He was wearing an off-white shirt with sweat stains under the arms, and a pair of ratty old boxer shorts and grey woollen socks. Sherlock had other, more respectable clothes, but he really didn’t see the point in dirtying them by wearing them. He didn’t do anything much nowadays.

This Saturday, Sherlock hadn’t planned anything at all. It had been two months since he’d left Baker Street and he hadn’t delivered anything since, hadn’t read any books because he was too frightened to go back to retrieve them. The morning after John’s abrupt exit, Sherlock had been greeted with an ‘I think you should leave’ and rather than cause an argument that the curly-haired man knew would feel like his insides were being twisted and turned and destroyed, he left the next day without warning and with nothing but a rucksack of clothes and money. He received two text messages on that day. ‘You didn’t have to leave so soon, do you even have anywhere to stay? JW’ and ‘You forgot your books’. Sherlock ignored them both.

Truthfully, he didn’t really have anywhere to stay. On the first night, he stayed with Molly, an old friend that had recently settled down with her fiancé and seemed irritatingly comfortable in her two-bedroom house. Sherlock really was fond of her, but the dinnertime chats and light-hearted conversations in the evening started to suck the life out of him, and he needed to leave. Despite her petty attempt at persuading him to stay, Sherlock left Molly and her soon-to-be husband on the second day of leaving Baker Street.

It was the next part of Sherlock’s life that he probably should have wished had never happened, but to be perfectly honest with himself, he didn’t believe he had the capacity to feel regret anymore.

As the next few days rolled by, Sherlock found himself wound up amongst a homeless network, shifting between the natural currents and finding himself an almost comfortable place to sleep in a shelter in the outskirts of London. It was here that he let himself flood: the ready availability of alcohol was a blessing and the nonchalant attitude towards casual drug use was an advantage to Sherlock’s shifting moods. In this short period of residence, he ended each night with a calm joint and a couple of fingers of whisky. The pot filed away the jagged edges of his exhausted nerves; the whisky helped him sleep through his nightmares. It wasn’t long before Sherlock didn’t dream anymore. His phone battery had long since died, but for some unspoken reason he kept the battered Blackberry in the pocket of his messy grey slacks, perhaps as an anchor to his past self, perhaps just because it was the most valuable thing he owned right now.

Sherlock’s flat came about randomly on one grey Sunday. It formerly belonged to another burnout junkie from the same block that Sherlock bummed about on: in fact, legally, it still did. The guy’s name was Ray, and he’d gone from smoking your average teenage daredevil’s amount of weed to injecting the strong stuff into veiny skin, incapacitated in one of the more shady shelters across town. The flat had been deserted for weeks, Sherlock’d been told, and out of the pure curiosity he’d once been proud of, he went to go check it out. The place was okay enough, with a working bathroom and kitchen, old TV, not connected to any satellites but to a decent enough DVD player. The water tank still worked and if he didn’t piss about then he could get a relatively lukewarm shower, more than he’d experienced in the couple of months he’d been living rough. Sherlock decided on the spot that he’d just live in Ray’s flat. And that was that. Nobody noticed he was gone, not that he expected anyone to: people went missing all the time on that estate. It was actually kind of peaceful to know that he could just _go_ , without leaving any trace behind, a faint grey pencil line on a canvas of dark scribbles and fucked-up masterpieces.

Of course, squatting in a drug addict’s flat had its complications, and on the odd occasion Ray had actually sobered up enough to remember he lived somewhere, not in the decrepit shack he’d been staying in. Fortunately for Sherlock, Ray’s version of ‘sober’ was completely off the scale for most people, and most of the time he was still so inebriated that he didn’t even notice somebody else had been living in his home. Once, Sherlock had been watching a scratched copy of _Jaws_ when Ray had burst through the front door of the flat, staggering loudly into the wall and probably making a dent in the shoddy paintwork.

“Who th’fuck are you?” he had spat, taking a risky swig from a yellowed bottle of cheap vodka, spilling most of his desired mouthful on the carpet.

“I’ve been here for ages mate,” Sherlock had replied calmly, taking a hit from his joint without looking away from the TV, quite unafraid of what was going to happen. He was apparently right to be so calm: Ray then promptly vomited, belched, and left the flat. Sherlock was pleased that Ray had decided to launch himself backwards because there was no signs of bodily fluids inside the flat, just in the hallway outside, something somebody else would probably clean up.

Apart from those few disturbances, Sherlock had rarely experienced any problems. In the six months since he’d left Baker Street, Ray had only visited unexpectedly three times, and it had been at least three months since his last visit on Sherlock’s sun-kissed-but-cold-as-fuck morning. He assumed Ray had moved onto the even stronger stuff, had to stay in the shelter, maybe he got put in jail: he didn’t forget the possibility that Ray could have OD’d. Sherlock didn’t really have any emotional attachments to Ray and there was nothing in the apartment that really told him anything about the strange man, but he did kind of hope that Ray’s health stayed at least away-from-death. After all, if Ray died, then the apartment would probably get taken from him, and he didn’t really want to consider the complications that might ensue.

Sherlock didn’t do too much thinking nowadays anyway.

 

*

 

In a flash of sudden motivation, Sherlock Holmes decided he wanted some breakfast. He had a small food supply in the cupboards of the flat: some crackers, pickled onions, tinned baked beans, those kinds of things. Pickled onions and beans on crackers didn’t seem like too much of an appetising meal choice but Sherlock knew he had some not-too-stale-to-eat bread so he grilled it, cooked the beans, and made himself a nutritional breakfast of beans on toast. His head was banging still, but the daggers had sharpened somewhat, and in some way this was actually strangely comforting: the pain was becoming smoother, less jagged. It felt like he was being sliced rather than battered. He wasn’t complaining.

Dimly, Sherlock’s phone lit up on the kitchen table. Over the recent months he’d acquired a new charger, and, not to his surprise, he didn’t have any text messages. There had been one missed call, from Mrs Hudson, but that was months back and Sherlock didn’t bother to check if there was a message. If she and John had been so worried, they would have called the police. They obviously knew Sherlock wanted out, and they left him. Mrs Hudson wouldn’t have known why. He didn’t let that small fact bother him. _Tried_ not to.

The screen on his phone displayed 1 New Text Message from Joe, the manager of the local corner shop. Sherlock had managed to actually bag a job there, incredibly, and he worked there whenever he was needed and usually got discounts on stuff like alcohol and cigarettes. It was a pretty great set-up, and it was something that Sherlock actually tried to maintain because it was the one thing that was keeping his life steady. Well, it was the one thing keeping him alive: without his wages he wouldn’t actually have any food. He could continue to steal the water from Ray’s flat and was completely unaffected by the knowledge that Ray was still being charged for it monthly (even if he was careful about how much he used) but he couldn’t steal food from anywhere because he knew he was way too slow to get away without being caught. Prison was not somewhere he wanted to go, even if it was just for an overnight stay.

**Sherlock i need you @ the shop, Billy called in sick & i have nobody @ the counter, help me out & i’ll owe it to you, Joe**

This sudden responsibility made Sherlock dizzy for a moment and he had to wait for his head to clear but as soon as the black spots disappeared, he typed back a quick **_ok_ ** and stepped into the bathroom for a brief shower and shave. He dressed himself in a baggy shirt and jeans, not quite willing to commit to looking fully presentable today, ignoring the shadow on his jaw from his dodgy shaving and running his fingers through his damp hair as a substitute for brushing it. Sherlock then shoved on a pair of old and faithful trainers and left the flat, shutting the door behind him and not stopping to lock it because he didn’t actually own a key. He just lived on the hope that Ray had been a respectable man in his sobriety and that nobody would bother to burgle his only valuable items.

The corner shop was a minute’s walk from the flat and it felt like only seconds had breezed by before Sherlock was walking through the glass-pane door and listening to the mechanic beeping of the sensor in the doorframe.

“Sherlock! Thank god, I need to go run some errands and I’ve got an appointment at the hairdressers’, thank you for helping me out mate,” Joe said, immediately bombarding Sherlock as he wiggled his way past the barriers to get behind the counter.

“No problem mate,” Sherlock croaked, his voice cracking involuntarily as he coughed loudly to try and cover it up. Joe heard.

“Late night, ey?” he asked jokily, winking slyly as Sherlock tried to grin convincingly back. Joe was gone in a shuffle of seconds and soon Sherlock was by himself in the comfortable silence of the shop.

Over the course of the day, nothing much happened. There were a few kids buying sweets and eyeing up the spirits behind Sherlock’s head, a couple of old women stocking up on their bread or buying a carton of UHT milk _just in case_. After a couple of hours, Joe had come back, but Sherlock decided to stay because he had nothing better to do. Whilst Joe took this opportunity to do inventory in the back, Sherlock stayed behind the counter, idly filling in a crossword puzzle from some nameless gossip magazine with a pen that was quickly running out.

Sherlock didn’t notice the beep of the door when he was concentrating on what _8 down, another word for pulse (4)_ was. He was just finishing the curve of his t on the word _beat_ when he heard a small voice that somehow demanded your brain to think it was louder.

“Sherlock?”

He looked up and saw John.

“Jesus, you look fucking rough.”

His stomach plummeted five thousand miles into the earth, faster and faster, under the sea and into the earth’s core, burning, burning, burning.

“I haven’t seen you in ages, how’ve you been?”

Vines closed around Sherlock’s throat, searing images of cold nights near the drug shelters, under blankets with unassuming men who wanted to fool around, cold hands and cold lips and cold hearts.

“Sherlock?”

Fuck, he was a wreck. Sherlock was a wreck. All he wanted was to let himself burn to ashes for this man. All he wanted was to burn to the fucking ground.

“Oh, hello, John. I’m alright thanks, how’re you?” he wheezed.

“Yeah, good. Where’ve you been then? I haven’t heard from you. None of us have.”

Sherlock’s dry lips begged for moisture but his mouth had turned into a desert and he thought he was going to drown all at the same time.

“I- I’ve been out and about. Not really anything special,” Sherlock staggered his way through his speech, dusty winds battering him, sandy heat evaporating him.

He managed to fumble his way through an elaborate lie. John now thought he lived in a relatively respectable flat downtown and had just been taking some space away from everything, really. John thought the Sherlock he was seeing was actually thinking about coming back into the social sphere, as it happens. Yeah, what a coincidence. Pause for effect.

“So, uh, have you got any plans for the weekend then?” John asked awkwardly, apparently uncomfortable, but Sherlock could never tell with him because he just soldiered on like he always did.

“Oh, no, not really. Just came here today and won’t do anything tomorrow probably.” Sherlock replied, tracing his fingers across the patterns on his counter.

“Ah yeah, lazy weekends. Got to love them! Nice escape from the busy week, ey?” John asked, apparently as charismatic in any situation as he used to be.

“Yeah,” Sherlock said. _No,_ he thought. He did this in the week, too. It wasn’t stressful at all. If anything it was the opposite.

Sherlock wasn’t quite sure what was happening between him and John but he knew that if it continued for any longer then his nerves would shatter with more collateral damage than a quick hit could solve.

“Look, my shift’s ending in a couple of minutes, but it was nice to chat-“

“Yeah, yeah. Hey, is your number still what it was? Maybe I could text you and we could sort something out again.” John suggested. The thought of ‘sorting something out’ with John made Sherlock want to jump across the counter and smash his head into the floor, both in a bad way and in some form of a good way, but instead of voicing his thoughts he just nodded with a quick smile, scanned the newspaper John had come in for, and prepared for the nuclear fallout of his brain once John left the shop.

A resounding word echoed through Sherlock’s exhausted mind.

_Fuck._


	3. A Different Kind of High

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He was a camera shifting comfortably in and out of focus: he was the sunlight glowing through a curtain and slowly being dimmed by a passing cloud, soon to glow again.

After his little confrontation, Sherlock thought it best to get back to the minor comfort of the flat. It took him longer than he imagined walking back, occasionally finding himself wandering back and forth across the pavement and causing difficulties for other passers-by. His nerves buzzed like wasps trapped in jars, banging against the sides, not quite aware that with every feeble attempt to escape, they smashed their wings even more.

When Sherlock got back, he had to distract himself from realising this wasn’t home, nowhere was home – the smack in the face of seeing John had resurfaced all of his previous anxieties, the ones that he’d dimmed with weed and spirits, the ones that he had drowned in the puddles amongst the other burnouts, the ones that he had dismissed with the other fuckups, ones that he’d been able to forget after a drunken night with some stinking pothead who _didn’t care if you’re a guy, just let me forget about this hellhole for a couple of hours_.

Almost immediately on impact of his flat, he bee lined for his stash of weed. He kept it in a sofa cushion that was steadily losing its stuffing through a hole in the back. That was just on the off-chance that anybody traced this flat back to a serious drug-addict: precautions were necessary.

Flipping the cushion over frantically, Sherlock fumbled around for the small plastic bag containing the ridiculous little plant that seemed to have the powers of calming him down for a while. Pulling the bag out, his stomach dropped another level into the earth.

He’d run out.

 _No, no, no,_ Sherlock’s thoughts buzzed manically around his skull, bashing and madly trying to escape, failing, only making him dizzy and sick.

There had to be _some_ thing in this shithole.

Sherlock ran into the bathroom. He slammed open all of the cupboards, knocking products off of shelves, throwing toothpaste and shampoo onto the floor, dragging his hands across walls and skirting boards for hiding places. Nothing. He ran into the bedroom area, checking the skirting again, working up a sweat, ignoring everything that tried to prey on his mind and simply _focusing,_ just _looking,_ finding. After a couple of minutes searching there he gave up and checked the kitchen, knowing there would be nothing because that was the only room in the entire house that he’d actually thoroughly searched because he needed all the food he could get.

After half an hour’s scavenger hunt, Sherlock found nothing.

Collapsing into the corner of the sitting room, he slammed his fists into the walls, again and again, not caring that he could draw blood, just wanting some _escape_ , not wanting to get _drunk_ or _high,_ just wanting to be somewhere else.

His eyes scanned the sitting room. It was completely fucking bare, apart from that DVD player and the ripped up sofa and the chunky as fuck TV.

_The TV._

It was huge, massive, and falling apart. And it was pushed into the corner of the room so that its monstrous backside wasn’t on show to the rest of the flat. There was next to no chance that what Sherlock was thinking could be true, but what the fuck? What did he have to lose?

He jumped up, feeling deftly for any loose fittings or breaks in the smooth figure of the TV. For a  moment he thought he’d hit another dead end again until his fingers found a small flip catch on the left side of the TV’s exterior. Flipping it open he found a makeshift box fitted into the inside, and pulling it out, he peered at what was inside. His heart lifted and dropped at the same time at its contents.

A little heroin kit.

Sherlock probably should have known, what with this being Ray’s apartment. He let himself hesitate. For a moment, he actually thought about his own life with some respect.

But then he remembered that he was a giant fuckup who fell in love with his confused best friend. The very same best friend who played on his mind constantly and would send him insane without a steady supply of chemicals to dilute his brain – a supply, which until moments before, had run dry.

He’d seen enough heroin addicts out on the street to know what he was doing. They’d mostly been using a synthetic drug, China White they called it, but you took it the same way. Truthfully Sherlock wouldn’t have even known if this was fake too: he didn’t care.

Rushing to the kitchen table, Sherlock fished the key to the drinks cabinet from the shop from his jeans pocket (Joe hadn’t noticed it was missing: so far, Sherlock hadn’t needed to use it) and laid it out. Shaking out a small pile of white powder, he used the key to neaten it up and decided he’d snort a little just to get a feel. His key bump made a scraping noise against the wood of the table as he sniffed the powder, feeling it join his body in a surprisingly soft motion. He’d never snorted before and he’d expected it to be harsh and uncomfortable: it wasn’t that bad.

Sherlock sat himself down on the sitting room floor and not long after he felt the effect of the drugs. Waves of calm ebbed into him, ebbed out, ebbed in. He felt like one of those animations they play on a PC when there’s no video for an audio clip: a smooth transition of colours and shapes and inaudible sounds and impossible movements. Sherlock felt his muscles relax into the wall and he let himself sit there for an hour, enjoying the ebb and flow. Occasionally the calm water would bring in a slow rush of nausea, but a sure feeling washed over Sherlock and he was certain it would just go away with the next wave, would wish itself way as the tide trickled. He was a camera shifting comfortably in and out of focus: he was the sunlight glowing through a curtain and slowly being dimmed by a passing cloud, soon to glow again.

When his calm wore off, he decided he wanted the real thing.

 

Thoughts were unnecessary now: Sherlock no longer had a conscience; he no longer existed in another person’s universe. It was him and his needle, and he did not care for anything else.

The needle was sterile, in a small medical package complete with an antiseptic liquid for an extra level of cleanliness. In the small box Sherlock found some cotton, a lighter, and some antiseptic wipes. He grabbed a teaspoon from the kitchen and poured a small glass of water from the tap.

He poured some of the powder onto the spoon and dripped just the right amount of water so that the drug mixed correctly. He took the lighter and added heat to his mixture, watching it bubble like some children’s cartoon witch brew. He used the cotton to filter his drug and prepared his syringe, sterilising his arm and the needle again as a precaution. Using one of his belts as a tourniquet, Sherlock chose a vein in his forearm, and for the first time in his life, he took a hit of heroin.

 

He was sentient. He felt as though he was sat cross-legged in the middle of the ocean in the middle of the sea on the middle of the beach on the highest building in London by the warmest fire on earth. Warmth and security flooded his being, so much so that he sank into the corner of the flat and for the first time in weeks and weeks he felt like nothing on this planet could hurt him. Nothing at all. A soft wall swirled around Sherlock in a way that wasn’t dizzying or uncomfortable… it was brilliant. Everything that tried to get to him would never reach. He was a barricade, a warrior, and he needed nothing, no one.

Suddenly, Sherlock felt sorry for everybody who didn’t realise how it _really_ was. They just didn’t _realise_ that they didn’t need anybody. They carried on with their relationships and their heartbreak and their sadness, but the thing was, Sherlock _knew,_ it just wasn’t like that. I mean, sure, he had his problems. Fuck, he still fucking loved John. John was still constantly on his mind and if he could he would kiss him for hours. But it didn’t _matter._ Not _now._  


For two hours, Sherlock sat and contemplated how easy it would be if people just realised that they didn’t need to stress about anything. It was getting dark outside and the streetlamps flickered on outside the flat. Through the open window Sherlock thought it looked similar to the way light glints familiarly through water: the way it glows and wavers in a way that you just _know_. 

When the high was fading, Sherlock started to feel like maybe his plans were a little crazy. After a while he disregarded his ideas but still thought he could continue to live a stress-free life by himself.

During this cool-down period Sherlock’s phone started to ring. It buzzed atop the kitchen counter angrily and when Sherlock tried to get up, his legs faltered and he collapsed into the wall. Flustered but motivated, he managed to stand the next time, and, despite staggering quite strongly, he pressed the Engage Call button on his phone.

“Hello?” he mumbled almost incoherently.

“Sherlock? It’s John,” the other voice shouted.

“John! Hello, John, how lovely to hear your voice,” Sherlock slurred, letting himself slide down the kitchen cabinet and enjoying the cool air nearer to the ground. He heard an uncomfortable laugh on the other end.

“Listen, Sherlock, I have a really outrageous suggestion-“

“I love outrageous suggestions,”

“-and I don’t mind if you say no but-“

“I won’t say no,”

“My colleague was planning on going to Paris wi- Sherlock, are you okay?”

“Me? Yes, I’m fine. Do go on, John,” Sherlock swayed slightly even in a sitting position and he let himself lie his face down on the cool linoleum of the kitchen floor.

“Oh, okay. Basically, Sherlock, my friend and I were going to go to Paris but he pulled out last minute because his mum had a heart attack. Bloody terrible timing, but it can’t be helped, right? Anyway, just seeing you today made me think – well, I don’t know but it made me wonder – I’m not sure if this was a good idea – it just made me think-“

“I’d love to go to Paris with you, John Watson.”

Seconds of silence passed.

“Really?”

And again.

“Of course.”

“Well it’s a bit short notice is all, we’re supposed to leave on Tuesday and I-“

“I don’t have anything planned, I can be ready by Tuesday.”

“Oh, well. Oh. Right then, okay. I’ll see you on Tuesday at Baker Street, then?” John asked timidly, almost as if he were embarrassed. As the chemicals still swam through his blood, Sherlock didn’t notice.

“Sounds fucking great, John. I’ll see you then.”

And then he hung up.


	4. Paris

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck, Sherlock Holmes thought, muttering under his breath and retching dryly into his lap.  
> Fuck.  
> I am going to fucking Paris with John Watson.

 

At midday on Sunday morning Sherlock Holmes woke up to a dirty linoleum tile plastered to his face, drool slick on his cheek and his hair matted to his face by sweat. He remembered only snapshots of the previous night. He remembered something… big.

His phone’s LED light was flashing to show he had a message. Clicking to see what it was, the events of his high came flooding back to him like a tidal wave at the base of a tsunami.

 

**Be at mine for 2 on Tuesday, the ferry from Dover leaves at 5:30 and we want to get there in time, JW**

Bile rushed its way up Sherlock’s throat and he only just managed to pull himself up to the sink before he threw up violently, shaking fervently and feeling an ache blossom in all of his muscles. He saw a faint pink pin prick on his forearm, and suddenly, he was angry.

He rushed over to the toxic kit and smashed at it, the needle discarded on the floor. He grabbed the wipes and the powder and threw it angrily out of his window, watching them tumble and fall into the large dumpster behind his flat. He then swiftly threw the needle out after, not before wrapping it in a thick layer of toilet roll, for some reason not wanting it exposed to the air outside.

 _Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck,_ Sherlock Holmes thought, muttering under his breath and retching dryly into his lap.

_I am going to fucking Paris with John Watson._

 

*

 

_Do you mind if we do not go to the Louvre_   
_If we say sod off to sodding Notre Dame,_   
_If we skip the Champs Elysées_   
_And remain here in this sleazy_   
  
_Old hotel room_   
_Doing this and that_   
_To what and whom_   
_Learning who you are,_   
_Learning what I am._

The journey to Paris was silent and unforgiving. John and Sherlock took a coach to Dover and sat in separate aisles; on the ferry they sat opposite each other and stuck their noses firmly into the pages of a book.

Sherlock had to avoid eye contact at all times. He was so sickeningly worried that his heart would pour out of his eyes if they stared into John’s for too long.

In France they stopped at a service station and the two men departed for a half hour to wander around the various shops and stalls until they had to return to the packed-yet-lonely coach. Each returned with an opaque, white plastic bag and a downwards glance as they resettled themselves into their seats.

It was raining in Paris.

John and Sherlock arrived at their hotel in the late afternoon. Sherlock had been expecting something respectable and business-like, something that John Watson would choose for two nights in Paris. What he was greeted with was something he hadn’t expected: something that resembled a rather shabby motel, with flashing neon signs outside and an uncomfortably small car park.

As they walked quickly with their small suitcases into the lobby, Sherlock stole a glance at John and was surprised to see that the smaller man had his face buried in his coat collar, looking almost abashed, even more uncomfortable than Sherlock himself. He hadn’t thought that possible.

Upon arriving at the ‘main reception’, a shabby little office desk and spinning chair, John and Sherlock acquired their room key (Sherlock was only slightly unsettled to learn that they’d be sharing a room – there would be twin beds, but the thought of being unconscious in the same room as John Watson made his insides flutter in a way he couldn’t describe) and they made their way up some intimidatingly dodgy stairs to their room.

The overall first impressions of the place weren’t improved by the state of the hotel room. There was an ugly crack across the ceiling and the paint on the walls was peeling quite profusely, the window frosted over in a less-than-artistic manner and the carpet a dusty grey colour.

And, of course, there was the small matter that the twin beds Sherlock had been expecting was actually just one double.

“Oh, shit. Shit. Sorry. There must have been a booking mistake, I- we can go down to reception and ask about it,” John began to stutter as he realised that there was no boundary in the middle of the bed. It was the first time he’d uttered a full sentence since he and Sherlock had left England.

Sherlock rubbed his forehead and let his fingers massage the skin almost roughly. He had a harsh headache and all he could think was _weed alcohol kiss John no get me out get me out get me out._ He still couldn’t look the other man in the eye properly and he felt nauseous whenever he let his mind wander. He hadn’t smoked anything useful since their departure from England, just a pack of cigarettes with nowhere near the same effect as his drugs had. He didn’t regret not taking another hit of the stronger stuff but for a fleeting moment Sherlock childishly wished marijuana would just get legalised already.

“Really, John, I don’t think there’s any point-“ Sherlock tried not to notice the mix of emotions that flashed across John’s face – he saw confusion, anger, disgust, but did he see a hint of a relaxation in the shorter man’s eyebrows, did he see comfort?- “I just don’t fancy the idea of either of us going back down that staircase again. I felt like I was going to get stabbed at least twice on the way up. Maybe even by the receptionist, he could’ve been keeping a knife in that beard of his-“

John chuckled softly, and it was the most beautiful thing Sherlock had heard in months.

“I could sleep on the floor for the first night and we could swap,” Sherlock suggested, looking up properly at John for the first time and struggling to keep his face straight as he did so. All he wanted to do was turn around and smash his head into the wall with frustration that he couldn’t waltz over and kiss him. He decided the wall was probably too fragile for that.

“Are you sure?” John asked. His forehead creased with concern and his mouth parted slightly and Sherlock let his eyes wander lazily across John’s features.

“Yeah, of course,” Sherlock replied, trying as hard as possible to snap himself out of his daze. He busied himself with unpacking his bag by the bed so that John couldn’t see his face blossoming red.

“So what did you buy at the liquor shop?” John asked.

“What?”

“The liquor shop. Don’t act like you didn’t go, I have the exact same bag as you so I know,” he continued, and Sherlock looked up to see John had painted a smirk across his face and was holding up his white bag. Sherlock’s lower abdomen fizzed and he snapped back down again to retrieve his bag.

“I got a bottle of whisky,” he said once returning from his suitcase, gormlessly holding up the bottle. John pulled an approving face and pulled out his bottle.

“Rum,” he said, and then dropped the bottle onto the bed and walked across to the cabinet across from the bed next to the wall. He came back with two small glasses and was very proud to present them to Sherlock.

“Hotels always have glasses,” he stated, grabbing his bottle of rum and working at the cap. Sherlock looked uneasily at the liquor and rubbed at his neck. He wasn’t sure if getting roaring drunk in front of John was a good idea anymore. He’d bought the whiskey for moral support, the only thing he could really consume in France that would make him feel better.

“Sherlock, it’s been stiff and awkward since we left London and I don’t intend for it to stay that way for long.” John stared pointedly at Sherlock’s gaped mouth. With that, Sherlock nodded in surrender and took a glass of golden brown rum, lifted it to his mouth. The sweet and familiar taste comforted him almost immediately, and after another glass he felt his muscles loosen slightly and he was able to sit by John without his heart threatening to rip its way out of his chest.

After two hours, John Watson and Sherlock Holmes were smashed.


	5. Us

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gradually Sherlock noticed he felt less and less drunk. It was like the haze of the room was being cleared, like it was being replaced. It felt like he was drunk in a different way.

“What, so you had to hold a man’s balls while he coughed? Is that what you do?” Sherlock sniggered into his glass, laughing as John batted his arm lightly and enjoying the swaying sensation that any movement gave him.

“It’s normal for a GP to do that, it’s- it’s- well, it’s bloody disgusting but it’s normal,” John spluttered and after a moments competition between the two men of keeping a straight face, they both burst into laughter and fell back against the bed’s headboard. Suddenly, John hopped off of the bed. Staggering slightly, he set out to explore the room in more depth. There was a slide-door wardrobe that he hadn’t looked in and upon opening it he gasped dramatically.

“Sherlock! Come look!” he giggled like a little girl and pointed at a bulky object in the wardrobe. After a slight wave of nausea Sherlock regained his balance and saw upon closer inspection that the object was an old record player, the vintage kind, the one that he’d seen in shop windows that were trying to bring retro back. The player was covered in a layer of dust but John got clear fingerprints in it as he pulled it out, revealing an old record that was tucked behind it.

“What’s the vinyl?” Sherlock asked, bending over John and not minding in the slightest that his front was pressed against John’s back. It hadn’t bothered him after his third stiff whisky. John held the record up to the light after blowing it to get rid of dust and read with squinted eyes.

“Nina Simone,” he replied, shrugging and indicating that he had no idea who she was.

“Put it on!” Sherlock cheered, putting his glass on a cabinet and helping John manoeuvre his way around the record player. Soon, the crackling noise of the record resonated in the room and John sat triumphantly on the floor beside it.

“Dance with me,” Sherlock said. A soft waltz was being played on the record and Sherlock pulled John onto his feet, placing his hands on the shorter man’s waist and letting him put his arms around Sherlock’s neck. They danced in circles around the room carelessly, their eyes rolling drunkenly.

_I need you here, my darling. Together for a day._

Their feet often bumped into each other but they ignored it as they padded across the room.

_Just you, just me, my love._

John had somehow let his head rest into Sherlock’s chest, his breathing like a mist on Sherlock’s skin, the heat of his life whispering out of his mouth and flaming against the fabric of Sherlock’s shirt. He let his head rest on John’s, his nose breathing in the sweet smell of his hair.

_I can’t go on without you. Your love is all I’m living for._

Gradually Sherlock noticed he felt less and less drunk. It was like the haze of the room was being cleared, like it was being replaced. It felt like he was drunk in a different way. He could still feel John breathing against his chest.

_I need you here beside me._

The touch of John’s fingertips against the bare skin of Sherlock’s neck suddenly burned but not in a way that made him flinch. It was a gentle burn, a good one. It wasn’t like the fire that had erupted within him at Baker Street. It was dwindling, but it was there. The sudden realisation that Sherlock was holding John Watson in his arms became apparent to him.

“John,” he whispered as the song began to end, as the applause of the live song broke into the room and John pulled his face from Sherlock’s chest and stared doe-eyed at him.

“John,” Sherlock whispered again.

And then they were kissing.

The record skipped and stopped but neither of the men noticed. John’s mouth was warm, soft, and it fit dizzyingly perfectly against Sherlock’s. The two men paused against a wall and used it as a surface to lean against, their lips moving slowly with each other, not hungry, not greedy, just _right,_ just there and just right. John moved his hands up Sherlock’s torso slowly and Sherlock felt lightning buzz at his fingertips. He took the shorter man’s jaw in his hand and deepened the kiss, lightly grazing his teeth against John’s lower lip and welcoming the tightness that John created as he moved closer to Sherlock, tracing his tongue across his teeth, copying Sherlock and taking the taller man’s face with his hand, standing on his tiptoes. They kept their eyes closed, ignoring the world around them and focusing only on the heartbeat of the other, moving in rhythm, moving in time. Their noses bumped gently as they moved their heads and necks, making up for lost time, becoming more needy now, holding the other man with a tight arm. They were almost racing against time, wanting to feel as much as they could before time took them away from this warmth, wanting to take in as much of the sweet breath as they could into their lungs. Sherlock no longer craved smoke from a drug because John was intoxicating enough: their breathing caught again and again but it didn’t matter, ragged sighs escaped from Sherlock’s throat and he was captured inside this bliss and he didn’t care if he never found his way out.

A gentle push found John with the backs of his knees against the side of the bed, sat up but quickly falling down. Their kiss was broken for a short second as they shuffled across the mattress, John with his back against the wall and the headboard, Sherlock straddling John gently, leaning down to move his lips against John’s again.

They made snuffed sighs as they struggled to breathe through their noses.

John took a fistful of Sherlock’s curly hair and used it to pull him deeper, Sherlock closing any gap he could feel and pushing into John’s lap as much as he could. Sherlock’s hands were gliding across John’s body, bunching his shirt up and fingering the loose buttons near his collar. All the time they were moving, grinding, not quite aware but still moving like clockwork like they always had. They began to crave more, taking more in their mouths, clashing their teeth and biting lips until they began to swell gently, grasping the backs of necks and holding position by clenching legs.

This was pure ecstasy.

“Sherlock-“ John gasped between kisses, letting the taller man take his neck, his ears, his jaw as he gulped air, “Sherlock, I don’t- I’ve never- I don’t know what to do-“

Sherlock ignored his pleas and took his mouth again, pushing John’s tongue to the roof of his mouth and sucking, smiling at the way he felt John writhe beneath him, triumphing at the strained sighs that escaped from him.

“Sherlock-“

“-doesn’t matter, doesn’t matter,” Sherlock whispered, finally giving in and undoing the topmost buttons of John’s shirt and taking his mouth with him, biting and kissing the skin he exposed until the shirt was completely off and he could feel the cool vulnerability of the man beneath him. Sherlock took his kisses to John’s lower stomach, pushing his hips down as they bucked upwards and teasing the skin just above the elastic waistband of his slacks, taking a devilish glance upwards at John and grinning at the way he was staring headily back down at him. John let his head fall back onto the bed’s headboard with an uncomfortable thud, attaching his fingers loosely to Sherlock’s head of hair and lightly pushing, encouraging. Sherlock didn’t resist. In a flash of fabric John’s slacks came off and his boxer shorts were left bulging crudely in the cold Parisian air. The sudden change in temperature made John gasp and Sherlock palmed him heavily until he felt John harden fully under his hand.

“Jesus, Sher- Sherlock-“ he wheezed, shifting restlessly under Sherlock’s dominating body, trying to create some friction, anticipation pooling in the back of his neck and in his spine and pulsing through his blood to his lower stomach and finally-

“F-fuck-“

Sherlock had pulled off John’s boxers and rushed his tongue against the base of his dick, pulling upwards as slowly as he could, enjoying the tortured look of bittersweet pleasure and need on John’s face. Using his hand to steady himself he continued to lick in long, slow, and torturous strokes, John’s whimpers and moans music to his ears. He had to keep a fair amount of pressure in his right arm to keep John from bucking up too much and his left hand was wrapped tightly around John’s erection, pulsing slowly as Sherlock began to swirl his tongue around the head and down again. Just as John writhed beneath him, almost using his body to beg for more, Sherlock stopped. Fucking rough in a drug-ridden homeless network had made him precautious.

“Do- shit, do you have any condoms?” he muttered, absently stroking John as he cursed himself inwardly. Why couldn’t he just be reckless? Why did he care so much about himself all of a sudden?

John moaned and steadied Sherlock’s hand as he pulled himself up steadily, his eyes rolling visibly and his skin flushed by his armpits, his groin. He was still drunk out of his mind, Sherlock could tell. John reached down into his wallet and Sherlock felt a zap of energy in his groin. Why did he have them with him if?- what did he need them for if he was just with Sherlock?-

“Here,” John tossed a packet to Sherlock and immediately he slid it down John’s length, squeezing softly as he went, enjoying John’s sigh of content as he settled back into place on the bed. Sherlock hesitated for a moment, looking nervously up at the other man, delicately tracing his fingers across the soft skin of his inner thighs.

John glanced down and his eyes made connection with Sherlock’s briefly.

“Go on, then,” he said hotly, tangling his fingers in Sherlock’s hair and thrusting his hips up towards him.

_Oh, fuck,_ Sherlock thought, a dizzying pulse in his crotch stealing his train of thought as he took in the image of John, naked and blush, spread in front of him.

Fuck _yes,_ he said aloud, his mouth wet and hot, enveloping John again.


	6. The First Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Using the cabinet door handles to pull himself up, Sherlock stood precariously and felt the after-effects of the previous evening’s activities. His head stung with a vicious intent.

Sherlock hollowed his cheeks around John so that his cheekbones stuck out like razor blades. He continued to swirl his tongue, earning possessive tugs in the hair and frustrated groans from above him.

“M-more,” John rasped, clenching his thighs around Sherlock and rutting forward, essentially trying to fuck his mouth, shivering with a ghosted moan when Sherlock lightly grazed the underside of John’s erection with his lower teeth to keep him still.

God, it felt good.

Gradually Sherlock began to pick up his pace, creating a rhythm with his ups and downs and occasionally swallowing, humming, anything to hear those beautiful tortured sounds John made.

“Sherlock, jesus, Sher- fuck, Sherlock!” John cried out, his back arching from the bed, the friction of his movement causing him to bite back a moan, his breath hitching. The mumbled cursing and restlessness distracted Sherlock and he took his arm away from John’s hips and unbuttoned his jeans frantically, still flicking his tongue against John and making as much eye contact as he could. John kept staring down incredulously, as if he couldn’t believe what was happening to him, and Sherlock couldn’t deny that it was turning him on so much to think that those sounds John was making were all because of him.

Before Sherlock could get his free hand anywhere further than the tantalisingly thin fabric of his boxer shorts, John clenched around him furiously and his whole body flushed a deep scarlet.

“Sherlock, oh fuck, jesus,” he moaned, his eyes rolling up and his body going tense like a spring being pulled taut. All of a sudden the spring snapped and John’s hips lifted from the bed, pulling Sherlock further down on to him as he jerked and cried out, not caring that it had been fast, until he was spent and panting, spread wide on the bed. For a moment, he couldn’t move. Sherlock pulled away and disposed of the used condom, pulling himself back into John’s lap, rid of his jeans and grinding blindly into John’s lower stomach. Their lips joined again and they kissed furiously, biting lips until they were red and sore. Sherlock pinned John’s wrists above him against the wall, grinning devilishly at the overwhelmed groans that he earned.

Madly he sucked and nipped at whatever he could, collar bones, earlobes, feeling John’s neck go lax and still rolling his hips into John’s. Sherlock let their bodies rock together, feeling John’s hands jerk as he held them back, feeling the familiar rushing sensation in his lower abdomen, his rhythm erratic, rutting blindly into John’s crotch, melting into the thick moans he felt by his neck, his skin tingling as John’s hot breath brushed against his ear-

-his body was a shockwave, and he rode it, the fire that John had always brought him coursing through him, through his veins, through his being, and he was white noise. As he came he cried out into John’s neck, biting lightly just under his ear, losing his grip on John’s wrist and feeling gentle fingers push curly hair out of his eyes.

After they were done, Sherlock rolled so that they were lying side by side. They lay there for what felt like pleasant hours but what was in reality a couple of minutes. He hadn’t even realised that his boxers hadn’t had the chance to come off and suddenly he felt embarrassed, his face flushing pink. Turning to check that John hadn’t noticed his blush, he saw that the shorter man’s breathing had slowed, and that he’d fallen asleep. Hot affection ran through the red rivers of Sherlock’s body and he gently stroked the side of John’s cheek. John whimpered slightly in his sleep and Sherlock smiled fondly.

Remembering their agreement and figuring he shouldn’t push his boundaries, Sherlock scooted from the bed and moved the bulky record player out of the way on the floor. He found a spare blanket in the closet and laid it out, taking a pillow from the side of the bed that John wasn’t unconscious on. After tucking John underneath the thick duvet, Sherlock took the woolly bed throw and covered himself with it on the floor of the hotel.

He knew that tonight would be the first night in months that he’d sleep perfectly.

 

*

 

As the sun rose in Paris, Sherlock woke groggily to a crick in his back and an uncomfortable ache in his arm from where he’d slept on it funny. He allowed himself a couple of minutes to fully wake up before he pulled himself into a sitting position and raked a shaking hand through his curls. It looked like John was still asleep: he was laid flat on the bed with his hands clasped across his stomach. He always had a military-like appearance, and even now in his dreams he was taut and neat like he always had been. Last night had been the only night Sherlock had seen John Watson lose control.

Using the cabinet door handles to pull himself up, Sherlock stood precariously and felt the after-effects of the previous evening’s activities. His head stung with a vicious intent.

“Shit,” Sherlock hissed quietly, realising he hadn’t washed at all since he’d pushed himself off of the bed last night. He was so pissed and so drunk off the pleasure that he’d forgotten to even wipe himself down.

Upon checking the bathroom, Sherlock found a shower that was surprisingly clean for the overall standard of the hotel, and he nabbed a towel from the closet and cleaned himself up, relishing in the properly heated water, taking longer than he should have because he couldn’t quite bring himself to get out. When he came back into the room, John was awake, and on some kind of impulse Sherlock span around when he realised he was only wearing a bath towel. As soon as he had done so he flushed red, embarrassed.

“You don’t have to hide your legs from me, Sherlock,” John said, his voice tired and dripping with the effects of a hangover. Sherlock timidly turned around again and sat himself down on the bed across from John.

“I might have used a bit too much hot water,” Sherlock mumbled, trying to suppress the shiver that ran through his body when he noticed John’s eyes trailing across his bare chest, stopping just where the towel folded by his lower abdomen and then looking back up, straight into Sherlock’s eyes.

“That’s okay, I’ll not take long.” John smiled, hopping off the bed and leaving the other man almost cowering, suddenly shocked at how vulnerable he felt under John’s collected gaze.

He’d been vulnerable before, but in different ways. This way was by far the best.

 

Soon enough John was out of the shower and then they were both sat on the bed in nothing but a towel each. It was surreal. Several months ago, they lived in a flat together and occasionally saw each other leaving the bathroom. Three months and Sherlock had forgotten what it was like to spend time with another person he cared about. Last night, he had had John Watson lying naked in front of him. This morning, John was sat next to him in just a towel. Sherlock’s life was zig-zagging like an erratic polygraph reading.

“So… what are we doing today?” Sherlock asked, unable to conceal the naivety that he heard in his own voice, hating the fact that he felt he sounded like a little kid, excited for a holiday in Paris.

John scratched his chest absently and Sherlock’s eyes flicked up and down as he struggled to concentrate on what he was saying.

“I don’t know, really… I’m not much of a sight-seeing person, I don’t really fancy that. Loads of bloody people crowding around an oversized pylon? Not for me, thank you.”

Sherlock’s heart leaped unexpectedly and he looked down at his hands, pulling at the tender skin around his fingernails.

“Why did you book a holiday in Paris with your friend if you don’t like sightseeing?” he asked quietly. He was met with silence for a moment. Then, John cleared his throat raggedly and scratched his chest again and Sherlock sneaked a glance at him.

“I don’t- I don’t know, I suppose he just wanted to come and I agreed. Didn’t think about it enough, did I?” John chuckled, scratching the back of his neck and looking awkwardly at Sherlock. With that, Sherlock couldn’t look at him without his heart threatening to pump itself right out of his mouth, so he got up and bent down to his suitcase on the other side of the bed. He gulped air down into his throat and tried to breath evenly. John had said he didn't have to hide his legs, right? Did that mean he didn't have to hide everything else? Retrieving a pair of clean boxer shorts and a shirt, he shifted his towel down to the floor and stepped into the boxers.

“Woah, Sherlock,” John whined and laughed, turning his red face away from Sherlock’s bare backside and suppressing a childish grin. Sherlock whipped around with the shirt covering his crotch and the boxers falling back down to the floor.

“Sorry! Oh, god, sorry, sorry, I- I don’t even know what I was thinking-“

John grinned, clear amusement painted in gaudy colours across his face.

“Come here,” he said.

“What?”

“I said, come here.”

“I know you did but I don’t know what you mean.”

“I was too pissed to do anything last night.”

“I don’t mind, I-“

“Bloody hell, Sherlock,” John reached forward and snatched the shirt away from Sherlock’s front, revealing him completely. Sherlock was almost too shocked to move so he fell quite happily into John’s grasp as he pushed him back onto the bed and straddled him. Sherlock noted with a hysteric amusement that they’d swapped positions.

John trailed his calloused fingertips across Sherlock’s bare chest, moving his crotch slowly against Sherlock’s, smirking as he felt him hardening beneath him. He slowly leaned forward, making sure that the fabric of his towel brushed against the sensitivity of Sherlock’s erection.

“This is what you get for making me a bottom,” John whispered into his ear.


	7. Morning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was beyond perfect. Sherlock had forgotten all about his crappy flat in London, his crappy life in London, his crappy memories in London. He was in Paris with John Watson now, and that was all that fucking mattered.

He knew what he was doing and he was not afraid to show it. He kept rocking slowly against Sherlock, earning low moans of approval. Sherlock often tried to get his hands down, to touch himself, to touch John, but John kept pushing his hands back and even though his arms weren’t as long as Sherlock’s, the taller man felt he had to oblige. He couldn’t risk this going wrong. It was going too right for it to stop. He linked his hands into the headboard of the bed and white knuckled it, gripping it tight and using the strength in his arms to push his body up and create friction against John. This was spontaneous and unexpected but that made it so much better, so much hotter. He watched John rolling his hips and small, pathetic sounds escaped his lips and he didn’t even care.

“Please,” Sherlock begged, unable to stand the slowness, the torture. John grinned again. He liked the dominance, he liked being in charge.

John un-tucked the fold of his towel and let it fall away, exposing himself and earning a slight gasp from Sherlock, who let his head fall back into the headboard and closed his eyes, overwhelmed.

“Oi. No closing your eyes.” John said, clasping a cold hand around Sherlock’s dick and squeezing so that Sherlock’s eyes ripped open and his hips rolled up in a desperate attempt to cause friction. John found this so much better when he was sober: last night he’d let Sherlock take him, but now he was taking control. He could feel Sherlock’s blood pulsing beneath him and he could tell that Sherlock was losing control, becoming animalistic and burning with desire. It turned him on.

“You lied,” Sherlock panted, desperately just wanting to _give in_ and succumb to John, finding it difficult to keep his eyes open.

“Lied about what?” John replied, beginning to create an actual rhythm with his hand, stroking up and down and watching Sherlock’s twisted facial expressions to know _just_ how to make him squirm.

“About not knowing what to do, yesterday night,” Sherlock paused to let out a shocked cry of pleasure, John beginning to hit the right spots. “You know what you’re doing, don’t lie to me, you know what you’re doing,” Sherlock’s breathing was becoming erratic and he almost seemed like he was pleading with John, the muscles in his biceps straining as he fought against his want to touch, feel. His eyes were flicking to John’s hand, then to his dick, then to his hand again, not knowing where to look, just wanting to let his head fall back in defeat.

“I don’t _know_ what I’m doing, Sherlock, I just- I think I pick things up fast,” he said, with a slight smirk as he saw Sherlock’s eyebrows raise in a manner than suggested Sherlock was thinking ‘ _obviously_ ’.

A moment of silence passed between the two men, except the strangled gasps Sherlock was making as John continued to take him further towards the edge and then dragging him back, a bittersweet game of cat and mouse.

“You- you can touch me if you want, Sherlock,” John mumbled almost inaudibly, focusing his attention on his hands, massaging and stroking and teasing.

“What?” Sherlock asked, his face flushed and strained.

“Touch me,” John repeated, and he leaned forward, took Sherlock’s hand from the headboard, and guided it to his erection. Simultaneously they groaned, Sherlock shifting so that he could push his forehead against John’s, so that they were tangled in a mess of limbs and hands. Together they began to stroke each other to a rhythm, the quiet room suddenly filled with a chorus of moans and sighs, the occasional slap of hips bucking up against thighs. It was so _intimate_ , John squeezing slowly as his face contorted with pleasure when Sherlock rubbed slightly harder than before. Gradually they both began to pick up their rhythm, each of them rocking into each other involuntarily, and they joined their lips, kissing as passionately as their hands were becoming. Sherlock trapped John’s lower lip between his teeth and John’s sudden dominance punished Sherlock by squeezing so hard that his mouth dropped open in a loud gasp. John then restarted the kiss, scraping his teeth against Sherlock’s lips and breathing hotly into his mouth, groaning against his tongue and occasionally crying out if their dicks brushed against each other slightly.

It felt like they were both coming close, the sounds of breathing become more ragged and broken, the atmosphere suddenly becoming hotter, their skin slick with sweat and their hair beginning to dampen. Sherlock thought back to the shelters: they were cold, and damp, and time went slowly and stretched itself out dully. Here, everything was fire and time felt as though it were running out, Sherlock feeling as though John could push him over the edge in a matter of seconds just by kissing him. He let his head fall back finally and he felt cool air rush across the sweat on his neck.

John grabbed Sherlock’s hair with his free hand and pushed him into a heated kiss, his hand moving rapidly by Sherlock’s crotch and Sherlock’s doing the same. Their moans became higher-pitched and almost staccato. It was only seconds before Sherlock came hard, thrusting up into John’s hand and crying out into his mouth, their lips still sliding fervently against each other. Sherlock continued with John, relishing in the sounds of his build up until John reached his climax too and they collapsed against each other, breathing heavily and taking a moment to recover.

“Fuck,” John panted, rolling over onto his side so he could look at Sherlock properly. Sherlock grinned through curly hair and took John’s cheek in his hand and they kissed softly, more gently now.

“Fuck,” John said again, but in a way that made Sherlock kiss him deeper.

 

*

 

They spent the rest of the morning lounging beneath the bed-sheets, lazily kissing and flicking through tourist leaflets that were kept in the drawers by the bedside. John had brought a book with him and he leafed through that whilst Sherlock lay contently by his side, watching his face as he read and stroking his leg affectionately.

It was beyond perfect. Sherlock had forgotten all about his crappy flat in London, his crappy life in London, his crappy memories in London. He was in Paris with John Watson now, and that was all that fucking mattered. He remembered with a smile how angry and terrified he’d been when he’d realised what had happened after his high. It seemed trivial now.

 A sudden nervousness crept into Sherlock’s blood then: he’d caught himself thinking what he’d done was okay. Sherlock absently scratched at the pinprick on his arm, trying to pull himself back into the now, focusing on the soft skin of the man he was laid in bed with.

“What’s that?” John suddenly asked, pawing at Sherlock’s hand to move it away. Instantly Sherlock jumped back, covering his arm.

“Nothing, just a scratch,” Sherlock tried to say it calmly but it came out shaky, nervous, as nervous as he felt.

“Sherlock?” John asked, concern dripping from his features. He went to snatch Sherlock’s hand out of the way again and Sherlock dodged, adrenaline rushing through his veins and his heart pumping erratically.

“It really doesn’t matter, Jo-“

John grabbed his arm and pulled his hand away whilst Sherlock’s attention was focused on speaking. His eyes trailed across Sherlock’s arm curiously, and when he reached the small pink dot, he raised his eyebrow.

“Why were you hiding that?” he asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Sherlock? I know that you’re lying.”

“I don’t like people to touch things like that,”

“Was it a blood test, then?”

“Something like that.”

“Sherlock?”

John’s eyes were pleading now, and Sherlock knew that he was fucked. His body language gave everything away: of course it wasn’t anything okay, he was tense and John could probably hear his heart beating from where he was sat.

“It was a stupid mistake and I regret it.”

“Sherlock! Jesus, Sherlock, drugs?” John sat up now, dropping Sherlock’s hand onto the bed and holding them up in a _what the fuck?_ gesture. Sherlock could feel a chill creeping up on him. _No, no, no_ , he thought. _Not now, please not now._

“I don’t want to talk about it,” he mumbled.

“I bloody do! What was it? Heroin?”

Sherlock’s silent response gave John the answer he was looking for.

“What the _fuck,_ Sherlock?! What made you think that was a bloody good idea?” he was stood up now, and Sherlock had to suppress a hysteric giggle: John was stood, stark bollock naked in front of him. But he was angry. He wrapped himself in a sheet until he found some clothes and was decent enough to look angry too.

“I don’t know John, jesus, I don’t know, I just-“

“You just what? You just thought it would be fun to inject a highly addictive drug into your arm? Fuck, I thought you were _better_ than that, Sherlock! Jesus,” he turned around, his hand on his forehead, clearly stressed. Sherlock had the sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach and he knew John was regretting everything from the previous night. He just knew it.

And suddenly he was angry, too.

“Oh, you _know_ me, do you? You thought I was _better?_ Well, John, I’m _not!_ You haven’t spoken to me for the past half a year, so how the _fuck_ could you think I was better? Where the _fuck_ did you think I would go after Baker Street?” he spat, his words dripping with venom. John’s hand fell from his forehead. Sherlock instantly regretted everything he said.

“I didn’t tell you to leave straight away,” he mumbled.

“I know, John- god, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I don’t know what I- I don’t know what I was thinking-“

“Neither do I.”

And with that he did the last button of his shirt, and left the room.

 

*

 

After hearing the door slam behind John, Sherlock lay back on the bed and he cried. He didn’t care that it was pathetic, he didn’t care that it was stupid, he just let the tears pool up at the corners of his vision and dribble down to his ears across his cheeks.

Everything had been going so perfectly and then Sherlock fucked it up like he always did.

John probably thought he was addicted: he didn’t know that it was because Sherlock had seen John that he’d even shot up in the first place. John didn’t even know about Ray’s apartment, didn’t know that the drugs weren’t Sherlock’s in the first place, that he found them by chance. John probably thought Sherlock was past the point of clear judgement. John probably hated him.

Sherlock was impressed by his ability to stay calm. He hadn’t smoked any weed in a whole day, and minus some shakes he’d been okay. John had made him okay. But now he felt sick: he had no alcohol, no drugs, nothing. He was in the worst situation he’d been in for a while and he had nothing. He couldn’t even go out and get anything because he was in fucking _Paris_ with _John._

Sherlock dressed himself, not being able to bear looking down at his naked body and remembering just what that body had been doing only hours beforehand.

He knew he wouldn’t be able to sleep, not now. He’d had one night of perfect sleep and now he knew that tonight would be the worst again. He didn’t want to think about what was going to happen tonight. Was John even going to come back? Was he going to have to leave without him?

Maybe that would be better than facing him again. Sherlock didn’t want to think about looking at John and knowing for definite that he didn’t love him back again. Sherlock didn’t want to think about the look of disappointment that would shade John’s face forever now. 


	8. Confession

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I want you to tell me everything that’s happened to you since you left Baker Street.” John said, not looking up from his hands.  
> “Wh-what?” Sherlock answered, his eyes still wet.  
> “You heard,” John looked up now, his fingers still fidgeting in his lap, “I want to know what’s been going on. You started doing drugs. I want to know what’s bloody happened, Sherlock. I still care about you enough to want to know what’s fucking happened to you.”

For two hours, Sherlock lay back on the bed. He would cry in bursts: suddenly a wave of sadness, an ache that moaned through his bones and in his stomach, would crash over him and he would break down, his face going red from the strain, his throat choking and his face wet. And then he’d calm down. He’d lie motionless for a while, his muscles losing interest in existence, and the sadness would come back but in a lower intensity.

And then it would all fucking start over again.

John came back when it was starting to get dark outside.

Sherlock heard the footsteps in the corridor and thought it might be a cleaner, and let his ears drown out the noise. But the footsteps stopped outside the door, and Sherlock was suddenly painfully aware of his surroundings. John slowly opened the door and stepped inside, carrying a few plastic bags.

“John, I-“

“Save it, Sherlock,” John scolded, walking over to his discarded suitcase and putting his bags inside. He then sat himself down, against the board at the end of the bed, opposite Sherlock who was leaning against the headboard. He took a glance at Sherlock’s face and winced.

“Do you want a tissue?” he asked, almost softly. It sounded affectionate and it made Sherlock want to throw up.

“No,” Sherlock replied, shaking his head violently and wiping his face with the tattered sleeve of his shirt. He was gasping for air almost childishly, his lip wavering in and out of his mouth the way that toddlers often wobble their lower lip when they cry.

John sighed and looked down at his hands, folded in his lap.

“I want you to tell me everything that’s happened to you since you left Baker Street.” John said, not looking up from his hands.

“Wh-what?” Sherlock answered, his eyes still wet.

“You heard,” John looked up now, his fingers still fidgeting in his lap, “I want to know what’s been going on. You started doing drugs. I want to know what’s bloody happened, Sherlock. I still care about you enough to want to know what’s fucking happened to you.” John’s voice wavered slightly. Sherlock’s body jolted at the word ‘care’, and he wasn’t sure if he was happy or sad about it.

For the next half an hour, Sherlock told John everything. About staying with Molly. About the homeless network, about the weed. About Ray’s apartment. About finding the empty plastic bag. About finding the heroin. He left out the parts where John had triggered him: he couldn't bring himself to tell John to his face that his face alone had sent Sherlock into a spiral so strong he'd taken heroin to calm himself down.

“Why did you lie to me in the shop, about where you live?” John asked after Sherlock was finished, his facial expression pained.

“I didn’t want you to know how fucked up I really am,” Sherlock said in a raspy whisper, playing with his hands in his lap, unable again to look John in the eyes now that he’d spilled his secrets.

“You’re not fucked up, Sherlock,”

“Well, I am, aren’t I? I’m a drug addict. I’m an alcoholic. And now I do heroin, apparently,” Sherlock’s voice cracked mid-sentence and he let his head fall into his hands, massaging his temples roughly.

“It’s my fault, though, Sherlock, if I hadn’t kicked you out you would nev-“

“No! No, John, no, it’s not your fault, shut up will you-“

John laughed nervously and Sherlock’s eyes trailed up to him. He sighed and ran a hand through his curly hair.

“I’m really sorry. This was supposed to be a nice escape from London, wasn’t it, I’ve ruine-“

“No, you haven’t. I’ve been having a really good time, actually,” John said, and his cheeks flushed.

“Really?”

“Yeah, really.”

The two men gazed down into their laps and for a moment they felt like two teenagers who were telling each other they fancied each other back. It almost made Sherlock smile. In the end, it was John who broke the silence.

“I’ve been thinking about something.”

“What’s that?”

“I was hoping you’d come back to Baker Street when we go back to London.”

Sherlock’s head snapped up and his eyes met John’s, not quite believing what he’d just heard.

“What?”

“Well, your apartment’s not really yours, is it? It doesn’t sound very nice and it’s not good if we’re going to try and get you clean,” John explained. Sherlock almost reeled back, his head overwhelmed. _I was hoping you’d come back to Baker Street. We’re going to try and get you clean. Clean._ Sherlock hadn’t realised he _wasn’t_ clean, and the idea of _becoming_ clean was an idea he wasn’t sure he liked. Clean with alcohol was okay, you could wean yourself off it, fair enough. Clean with illegal drugs wasn’t so simple.

“Are you sure?” _After what happened last time,_ Sherlock wanted to add, but he stopped himself. John nodded, and Sherlock’s stomach fluttered dizzily.

“Clean,” Sherlock whispered, and John eyed him carefully.

“Do you think you could do it?” John scratched the back of his neck idly, looking at Sherlock directly. “Get clean, I mean?”

“I don’t know. It’s never crossed my mind, I mean, I was high when you-“ Sherlock stopped himself, his heart racing to his mouth, his eyes wide as he realised what he was saying.

“What? You were high when I what?”

Sherlock sighed into his lap, wanting to pull his hair out, strand by strand. Had he gone and fucked it up again?

“When you called about Paris. That was the time I took heroin. I was so angry with myself that I threw everything out the day after.”

“Why were you angry with yourself?” John’s eyebrows were furrowed.

“I didn’t want to see you again, John. I thought it would be too painful.”

John stared down at his hands and Sherlock’s stomach churned painfully.

“Oh.”

Silence passed between them for a moment.

“So you were high at the shop, too?”

Sherlock groaned.

“No, I took it after. I… I got bad and I wanted to smoke some pot and I didn’t have anything left and I was so bad that I didn’t care when I found the heroin.”

John looked up from his lap and Sherlock saw that his eyes were beginning to water.

“So it was my fault, then?”

“No! No, John, no-“

“Shut it, Sherlock. I know when you’re lying,” he said, his voice breaking and a tear escaping from his eye. Sherlock had never seen John Watson cry before.

“I’ve fucked everything up, I’m sorry,” Sherlock began to push himself off of the bed, wanting nothing but to escape from the universe or just fall into a big hole and never stop falling.

“Why didn’t you want to see me? Why did it hurt?” John asked, and even though Sherlock couldn’t see his face, he could hear the tears in John’s voice.

Sherlock hesitated before he spoke.       

“Because I was in love with you and you didn’t love me back and you kicked me out and you broke me.”

John stayed perfectly still for a moment until turning around on the bed and facing up to see Sherlock.

“Will you kiss me?” he asked.

Sherlock nodded softly and leaned down, joining his lips to John’s and sitting back down on the bed. The kiss was somehow just right: Sherlock could taste the saltiness of John’s tears but it didn’t matter to him. Even though earlier he had felt as though the world was crashing around him again, even thought it was _because_ of John that he felt so terrible, this single kiss made him feel better.

He knew it was the worst idea he’d had in his life when he pushed John back onto the bed and deepened the kiss. He didn’t care.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Quick update note: I haven't updated in a couple days and probably won't for another day or two because I just went on a trip to Paris - ironic, I know - and I'm recovering from the kinda horrific and sleep-deprived journey, so! Also I have a lot of revision to do so I have to prioritise on some nights, egh. I wanna say how grateful I am of everybody who's looked at this fic, and liked it, given kudos and bookmarked. I am so happy that people are looking at my work and oh my god it just doesn't seem real that 461 real people have looked at this since I uploaded the first chapter, oh my sweet lordy doo. Thank you all so much.)


	9. Secrets and Truths

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Don't talk to me of love. Let's talk of Paris.  
> I'm in Paris with the slightest thing you do.  
> I'm in Paris with your eyes, your mouth,  
> I'm in Paris with... all points south.  
> Am I embarrassing you?  
> I'm in Paris with you.

_Don't talk to me of love. Let's talk of Paris,_   
_The little bit of Paris in our view._   
_There's that crack across the ceiling_   
_And the hotel walls are peeling_   
_And I'm in Paris with you._   
  
_Don't talk to me of love. Let's talk of Paris._   
_I'm in Paris with the slightest thing you do._   
_I'm in Paris with your eyes, your mouth,_   
_I'm in Paris with... all points south._   
_Am I embarrassing you?_   
_I'm in Paris with you._

Yet again this dingy hotel room was filled only with the sounds of lips sliding against each other, making crude and wet noises that were ignored when the two men realised how much they _needed_ this. But something in the back of Sherlock’s mind was making him lose his rhythm: he pulled back.

“I need to ask you something, John,”

“What?” John was flushed and seemed visibly distressed that he’d been pulled away from Sherlock’s full lips.

“You have to tell me the truth. Be honest when you answer,”

“Yes, Sherlock, whatever,” John whispered, but he wasn’t looking into Sherlock’s eyes, he was gazing hotly at his mouth.

“Tell me honestly, did you ask me to come to Paris for this? Was there really a colleague?” Sherlock asked, glad for a moment that John wasn’t making eye contact with him. John seemed taken-aback by this question, and sat back onto the bed. He kept his eyes low.

“I don’t see how it would make any difference, I- I don’t know why it would matter to you,” John mumbled, tracing his fingers across the duvet.

“It matters a fucking lot to me, actually, John. I want to know if you _want_ this. If you _wanted_ me from the start.” Sherlock had built up his confidence and was now staring indignantly at John. The shorter man let his eyes flick upwards.

“I don’t know what to say.”

“Tell me the truth!”

“I don’t think you’ll like it.”

“I don’t fucking care, John. I just don’t care. I want to know,” Sherlock took one of John’s hands, almost in a persuasive manner. It only seemed to make John feel more uncomfortable.

“I didn’t book the trip just for- just for _this_ ,” John said, gesturing to his hand clasped in Sherlock’s. Sherlock felt his heart drop slightly, and he didn’t know why, because it was what he was expecting. Of course it wasn’t for him. The double bed was a mistake. The condoms in John’s wallet – well, every man carries them in his wallet, don’t they?

“Why wouldn’t I like that?”

“What?”

“You said I wouldn’t like the truth.”

“I’m not finished,” John said, and his eyes dropped again.

“Go on, then,” Sherlock coaxed.

“I didn’t book the trip for this _between us_. But the colleague – well, he wasn’t a colleague. But let’s just say this wasn’t going to be a friendly trip to the tourist sites, oh God, Sherlock, this is so embarrassing-“

“What are you saying?”

“I booked a trip to Paris so I could fuck! Okay?” John wrenched his hand away from Sherlock’s and turned slightly, his face glowing red. Sherlock’s heart was pumping unsteadily and his palms were getting sweaty.

“Why are you so embarrassed? We’ve- well, we’ve done things, I-“

“-yeah, but we haven’t, _you know_ ,” John sounded like a schoolgirl, too afraid to say something taboo. Sherlock’s face flushed at the thought of _you know_ -ing with John Watson.

“Why did you have to come all the way to Paris just to fuck, then?” Sherlock asked, a sudden confidence in his voice that he wasn’t aware of. John turned to him, almost aghast.

“I don’t really like to advertise to everybody that apparently I’m as gay as a bloody rainbow! I’ve _tried_ with women, Sherlock, I really have! But it just doesn’t work! She’s fucking me and all I can think is _God, I wish she was a bloke!_ I don’t _like_ it, Sherlock, I don’t! It’s fucking difficult. It’s fucking hard.” John seemed exasperated, and he didn’t seem to realise that everything he’d just said had stabbed through Sherlock like a jagged knife. John was ashamed of what he’d done. He was ashamed of them.

“Everybody thought we were together when I lived at Baker Street,” Sherlock mumbled, and John snuffed in what seemed like laughter.

“Yeah, and look how that turned out. I got too excited one night and kicked you out until I was so sexually frustrated that I had to ask a complete bloody stranger to come to the _city of love_ to let me fuck him in the arse. Fucking brilliant,” John stood up and Sherlock immediately grabbed his wrist, out of impulse, not wanting John to leave again, not now.

“I don’t care about that anymore,” Sherlock said, barely audibly.

“What?”

“I don’t care about you kicking me out anymore. I care about you and me. Us,” Sherlock paused, almost cringing at what he was saying, “I wan- I need you, John. Be with me. Please,” Sherlock knew he sounded like he was begging, and he didn’t care. There was a glint in John’s eye that was fuelling him, a darkness in the pupil that suggested John was thinking the same thing.

“Fuck, Sherlock,” John’s voice was raspy and hollow, and Sherlock knew that he was doing something right.

“Fuck me, John,” Sherlock said, staring straight into John’s eyes and keeping his grip on John’s arm tight. And then John gave in.

He pushed Sherlock back onto the bed with so much force that Sherlock’s arm bent uncomfortably, but he didn’t notice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (I'm really sorry this chapter is so short, I'm writing the next part as fast as I can but I want it to be good! Thank you to everybody who is sticking with me even though I haven't updated in days, I really appreciate it, I love you all)


	10. Fuck

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John had a hand tangled deep in Sherlock’s curls and for a moment they just kissed: just let the passion flow between their lips and across their tongues. Occasionally Sherlock would nip at John’s lower lip to show somehow that he was ready, that he wanted this.

The damp coldness of the hotel room mixed confusedly with the sweaty heat that the two men created with each other, hands pushed against chests and strained creaks from the bed under the weight of them both. John had a hand tangled deep in Sherlock’s curls and for a moment they just kissed: just let the passion flow between their lips and across their tongues. Occasionally Sherlock would nip at John’s lower lip to show somehow that he was ready, that he wanted this. It wasn’t long before Sherlock grew impatient of the fabric that was blocking their bodies and he began to slip his fingers beneath John’s shirt, letting his hand ride up and taking the shirt with it. John obliged and broke their kiss to let it pass over his head and when he came back he began to massage the skin just above the waistband of Sherlock’s jeans. It was torturous, John’s crotch so close to Sherlock’s and his hands teasing him. Sherlock was beginning to feel uncomfortable with the heat that was gaining around his groin and he pushed John’s hand to the zipper of his jeans, gasping slightly at the pressure he exerted.

“Bit forward,” John smirked, undoing the zip and pulling the jeans around the tented boxers and discarding them to the floor. He then tugged at Sherlock’s shirt and pulled it over his head, keeping his palms flat on Sherlock’s chest and smiling at the shudder that rippled through Sherlock when his hands brushed against his nipples. Now Sherlock was laid out in front of John like he was being offered to him, and it made John’s stomach flutter when he remembered Sherlock’s pleading voice. _Fuck me,_ he’d said. Electricity coursed through John’s body straight to his groin.

After pulling his own trousers off and throwing them aside, John watched as Sherlock’s body writhed beneath him, his chest falling and rising heavily as his sweat-glistened skin shone in the light. A spark of emotion hit John in his chest and he realised that the man laid in front of him was beautiful: broken, but beautiful, and his for the taking.

John immediately went for Sherlock’s crotch, kissing his erection through his boxers and holding him down by his thighs, making Sherlock’s legs open wider and tracing his fingers beneath the waistband of his boxers.

“John, please- ah, don’t tease me-“ Sherlock was speaking in strained gasps, his eyebrows furrowed in frustrated pleasure, his torso muscles clenching furiously as his hips tried to buck up, stopped by John’s hands clamped down on his thighs.

“Just take me, fuck, John-“ Sherlock’s voice broke when John reached beneath the boxers and wrapped a cold-fingered hand around his dick, stroking upwards slowly.

“How are we gonna- how will we-“ Sherlock stuttered, but John quieted him by pulling his boxers completely off and doing the same with his own. Sherlock knew he would never get used to the sight of John Watson straddling him, naked, sweaty, horny.

“I brought stuff with me, I’m prepared,” John whispered into Sherlock’s ear before reaching down into his suitcase. The guy he’d booked to join him in France had said he needed to pay for his own lube, so he’d bought it online and packed it discreetly in the zip compartment. Sherlock wriggled impatiently beneath him when he saw the bottle, and John smirked, brushing his own dick against Sherlock’s and doing it again when a wave of pleasure rained around him after Sherlock moaned throatily at the friction.

“Would you do the honours?” John asked, uncapping the bottle and squeezing the lube into Sherlock’s cupped palm. For a moment Sherlock seemed dazed but he soon collected himself and began to stroke John’s dick softly to slick him up. John sighed and felt his knees threatening to buckle underneath him at the feeling of those long fingers massaging his length.

“My turn,” John said when Sherlock was done, spreading lube into his fingers and pushing Sherlock’s legs back and to the sides, making Sherlock utterly vulnerable beneath him, exposed. He pushed a finger into Sherlock, slowly wriggling it around and supressing a moan at the sounds Sherlock was making beneath him. Another finger went in and he tried to open Sherlock up for himself, moving his fingers and scissoring and doing whatever he could to hear Sherlock’s strangled groans again.

“Oh fuck, god, John-“ Sherlock’s head was lolling back against the headboard, his hands grabbing at the sheets on the bed. Once or twice he tried to reach down to touch himself but John pushed his hands away, wanting him to be for John and John only.

“I’m ready,” Sherlock gasped when he started to feel like he needed more than just John’s fingers inside of him. John pulled his fingers away and tugged slightly on Sherlock’s erection before steeling himself, positioning his dick just before pushing slowly into Sherlock. Tight heat immediately enveloped him and he had to control himself from not pushing further too fast. Sherlock’s face was contorted, only slightly in pain, mostly in euphoric pleasure. When he pleaded that John move again, John complied, pulling back and thrusting in slowly again, letting small gasps escape his lips.

“Stop treating me like I’ll break,” Sherlock groaned, wanting to take John’s hips and guide him but being blocked by his own legs pushed up against his sides. “Go faster, please,” he begged, and John couldn’t help but moan at the deep desperation in Sherlock’s voice. He began to thrust with a quicker pace, earning gratified moans from Sherlock, and soon their moans began to harmonise with each other as John’s first time with a man began to send shudders through his body.

“Fuck, Sherlock- I’ve never felt this fucking good, oh shit, yes-“ John’s hands pushed greedily at Sherlock’s legs as he tried to go deeper and deeper, hitting Sherlock’s prostate and hitting it again and again when he felt Sherlock twitch and writhe underneath him. Sherlock’s voice was becoming high-pitched, his moans becoming breathless, and John began to stroke his dick in time with his thrusts, sending him into a state that left him seeing white. They could both feel they were coming close and John’s thrusts became erratic, pushing himself forward so his lower stomach brushed against Sherlock’s erection as well as his hands.

“Fuck, John, I’m close-“

“-me too-“

The bed creaked furiously as they rushed towards their climax: Sherlock came first, his hips bucking hard so that he pushed himself down onto John further. John came seconds after, Sherlock’s pleasured cries making him feel overwhelmed, riding out his orgasm until he was completely spent and sensitive, pulling out of Sherlock and pulling his legs around his waist so that they were tangled together. He collapsed next to Sherlock and let himself gaze into the other man’s eyes for a long moment. Sherlock stroked the soft skin just above John’s buttocks and watched as John’s eyes fluttered closed, appreciating the intimacy of the moment.

“I’m still in love with you,” Sherlock whispered to John as their breathing finally calmed. John heard him, but had no answer. He didn’t know how he felt. He kept his eyes closed, and Sherlock seemed satisfied, turning to switch off the lamp beside him and then letting his head rest on top of John’s. They fell asleep still wrapped together beneath the sticky sheets and they slept dreamlessly, but peacefully.


	11. Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After what seemed like hours of bashful glances across the room and quiet case-packing, John and Sherlock were ready to leave Paris.

The next morning, the two men woke up in a haze, comfortably humming against each other and stretching, but not so much as to unravel their tangled limbs.

“What _will_ the laundry room think,” John whispered into Sherlock’s ear, referring to the stiff sheets that they were curled up beneath. Sherlock planted a timid kiss on John’s lips and shuffled closer to him, wanting to be as close as possible.

“I’m sure they’ve seen worse,” he replied, humming pleasantly when John kissed him back, but for longer, this time their lips smoothing against each other, a happy sound in the silent hotel room. Their breath was warm and dirty but neither man cared.

“What time do we leave for the ferry?” Sherlock asked, dragging his hands up and down John’s body absently. John groaned.

“Midday. I say we have half an hour to stay here and lie in, then we need to start getting sorted,” he said, positioning himself so that he had one hand beneath his pillow and one stroking the skin of Sherlock’s chest.

“Okay,” Sherlock smiled sleepily across at the man he loved and let his heart race when the man smiled back. For a while they kissed idly, all soft lips and heavy tongues, until they settled down comfortably with each other and napped. When John’s phone started to beep an alarm tone, they reluctantly pulled themselves from each other. They showered together, allowing each other to see the other man in another way they’d never seen before. When the water started to run lukewarm, they quickly fumbled and cleaned themselves up, their cheeks flushing pink as they realised they’d lost track of time together.

After what seemed like hours of bashful glances across the room and quiet case-packing, John and Sherlock were ready to leave Paris.

 

*

 

The coach ride to Calais was calm. John and Sherlock sat on different seats again: only this time, it was a matter of comfort and not awkwardness. John took this period of alone time as an opportunity to think about things. Or, more specifically, to think about Sherlock.

John had never felt as good as when he was with Sherlock, that was clear to him. The mere two nights’ stay had felt better to him than a life’s worth of sexual encounters with women before. John had only ever felt comfortable losing control like he had with Sherlock in Paris once before, and that was when he’d kissed Sherlock in Baker Street, but he’d stopped himself before anything happened.

But was he just over exaggerating his feelings for Sherlock because he’d never done anything with a man before? John was gay, or at least bisexual, but the only man he’d slept with was Sherlock, so how was he supposed to know if it was _Sherlock_ making it better or just the fact that Sherlock was a man?

John put a hand to his head and rubbed his temples. _God, this was difficult._

It wasn’t just because Sherlock was a man. John knew how he’d felt, straddling Sherlock that night. He’d looked down and he’d known he’d never seen anything so beautiful in his life, and that likely he never would again.

But he and Sherlock had been such good _friends!_ Would this just fuck up a perfectly good friendship? What even was ‘this’ anyway? John knew Sherlock loved him, but up until now John hadn’t thought of it as anything but sex. Did he love Sherlock? He tried to remember what he might define love as. Wanting nothing but the best for them? Putting yourself out on the line to protect them and keep them happy?

John had kicked Sherlock out just because he’d gotten too fiery one night. That wasn’t exactly what he considered to be an affectionate gesture.

_But what do_ you _think love is, John?_ He was asking himself questions in his head. Deep inside he knew that he’d always wanted to fall in love with a friend: it had been his fantasy since he was in his teens, but he’d imagined a girl in the friend’s role. Sherlock was his _best_ friend, he realised, although he wondered if Sherlock had ever seen him as a friend. When did Sherlock begin to love John?

The questions were beginning to give John a headache. He spent the rest of the coach ride contemplating how he felt, and the ferry ride, too.

 

On the other hand, Sherlock was panicking about returning to London. On the ferry ride back he noticed John’s face had clouded as if in deep thought. For a terrifying moment Sherlock thought that John had reconsidered his offer of Sherlock moving back to Baker Street, but he knew John well enough to know that once he’d given the offer he wouldn’t take it away. Even if it did mean living with somebody he couldn’t stand.

_He_ can _stand you, Sherlock, stop overthinking things…_

John wasn’t the only one asking himself endless questions. Sherlock tossed and turned in his seat back on the coach on the way to London as he wondered whether his and John’s relationship would change once they were back in London. The privacy and foreignness of the Parisian hotel room had changed them, somehow. Would the familiar setting of Baker Street send them right back to the start? Would history just repeat itself again?

Sherlock tried to imagine it – walking into the flat, seeing John holding a fresh cup of tea in his hands whilst he browses on his laptop. He looks up when he sees Sherlock and smiles. _Hey_ , he says, and pats the seat next to him. Sherlock joins him on the sofa and they kiss like they did this morning, lovingly, and everything is normal.

Sherlock imagined seeing John’s eyes darken on a tipsy evening at Baker Street. Feeling John’s hands glide up and down his body as they stumble to the bedroom, fumbling with John’s fly as they desperately try to rid themselves of their clothes-

-but no matter how hard he tried, it didn’t seem right. He could imagine it, clear as day, and he had to stop himself from thinking about it because it was sending flutters through his lower stomach, but somehow it just didn’t fit. Sherlock didn’t know if it would ever fit. His heart was beginning to sink when they neared their destination, glancing across at John and seeing his face concentrated on something important in his mind. He was probably thinking of how he was going to handle living with Sherlock again. It was going to be such a nuisance for him. Sherlock wondered if maybe he should offer to stay away, to make things easier. He decided to wait and see if John said anything.

Occasionally Sherlock would glance across the aisle of the coach and see John’s eyes flick frantically down, suggesting that he’d been looking at Sherlock and had been caught out. Sherlock’s heart and stomach fluttered each time this happened, even though he couldn’t be sure why John was even looking at him in the first place.

 

Soon, the coach arrived in London and it was a short taxi ride back to 221B. Upon arriving at the door, Sherlock’s nerves suddenly started to buzz and he wasn’t sure if he was prepared to go inside. It was a reassuring hand on his shoulder that calmed him down.

“Ready?” John asked.

“Ready,” Sherlock replied, and they stepped inside together. 


	12. 221B

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Although he admitted it felt strange to go back to his bed that night – he’d been sleeping on a mattress for such a long time, and for the past couple of nights he’d been sleeping with John – he still sank into the covers peacefully and slept solidly all night.

The first night at 221B was groggy: neither man had gotten much sleep on their travels and they moved around with muffled steps. Mrs Hudson fussed over Sherlock for a large portion of the evening, and Sherlock enjoyed reacquainting himself with the flat, tracing his fingers across dusty shelves and making the bed in his room, just like old times. He had caught himself staring up at the drinks cabinet once or twice, but he either stopped himself from looking too long, or John coaxed him away with something else about the flat he’d forgotten. Although he admitted it felt strange to go back to his bed that night – he’d been sleeping on a mattress for such a long time, and for the past couple of nights he’d been sleeping with John – he still sank into the covers peacefully and slept solidly all night.

The next morning, Sherlock woke to the smell of coffee, an odour he didn’t realised he missed until he smelt it wafting through his door. Pulling himself out of bed, he traipsed into the kitchen and leaned himself up against the fridge.

“Morning,” he said sleepily, and John, who had been warned of his presence by Sherlock’s dragging footsteps, smiled back at him and offered him a mug. Sherlock took it gladly, curling up on the sofa in the sitting room, his sorely-missed dressing gown draped around his bony features. John sat down next to him, placing his mug onto the coffee table and turning to face Sherlock with a quizzical look on his face. Sherlock put his mug down too, trying to think of something to say that would break the silence that had been created.

“Just like old times, ey?” he said awkwardly, adding a tried-too-hard chuckle. John shifted in his seat so that his feet were in Sherlock’s lap.

“Not quite like old times,” John said, moving his feet in a way that made them rub Sherlock’s groin teasingly. Sherlock froze almost at once, his stomach ablaze with fire but scared of what was happening, all the same. What if John felt how strange it was to be doing this in Baker Street, and kicked him out again?

“John, I-“

“What? Don’t you want to?” John sounded hurt but a closer examination showed that he had an amused smirk on his face, and his feet were squeezing harder.

“No, I do, I- just, after what happened last time- I-“ Sherlock stuttered, but he was cut off because John had leapt up and pushed himself on top of Sherlock so that his knees were up against the arm of the sofa and his face was inches above Sherlock’s.

“Last time, we hadn’t done what we’ve done,” John whispered throatily into Sherlock’s ear, slipping his fingers under Sherlock’s shirt and teasing the soft skin there. “Come on, I’ve wanted to try this ever since we got back,” John’s hips started to roll and the friction that he was causing made Sherlock bite his lip to suppress a moan. He nodded abruptly.

“Yes, okay-“ And John leapt up again, grabbing Sherlock’s hands and dragging him to his room.

When they got into the room John slammed the door shut and pushed Sherlock against the wall, shoving his hands underneath his nightshirt so far that they were reaching Sherlock’s collarbones, tracing up and down and sending shivers down Sherlock’s spine. It didn’t cross Sherlock’s mind that what he’d envisioned on the coach was coming true: it wasn’t his first priority when John started to nibble on his ear and circle the tender skin around each of his nipples.

One by one, their clothes were discarded: John slid Sherlock’s dressing gown from his shoulders easily and pushed Sherlock’s shirt over his dark curls in between kisses. John was only wearing boxers on his legs and they came off hastily, shortly after Sherlock’s shirt was removed. He was already unbelievably hard, the thrill of this fooling around in _Baker Street_ fuelling his arousal even more. Sherlock was groaning pathetically at the friction his pyjamas were causing against his own erection and John let his hands trail slowly down Sherlock’s body as he settled down onto his knees to pull the trousers and boxer shorts away. Sherlock’s arms twitched as John began to caress his dick with his tongue, staring straight up into Sherlock’s eyes and watching his reactions. When he swirled his tongue and began to suck, Sherlock’s hands clenched themselves tightly in John’s short-cut hair and he hissed something about being too close. John pulled away slowly and came back to be face-to-face with Sherlock, who slid John’s shirt off swiftly with a dazed expression.

“We don’t want you coming too fast, now…” John purred, taking Sherlock’s hand and tugging him towards the bed, shuffling back and taking Sherlock’s head in his hands to kiss him deeply when they were in the right position. Sherlock straddled his legs around John’s hips and let himself grind slowly into the shorter man, earning gratified moans from both of them, wet sounds of tongues brushing against teeth echoing around the room.

“What are we going to do?” Sherlock asked breathlessly, utterly willing to be under the shorter man’s command, ready to do whatever he was asked. John smirked at his flushed face.

“I want to watch you push yourself onto me,” John whispered, his voice breaking slightly as Sherlock continued to grind his hips lightly into his own.

“I’d like that,” Sherlock whispered almost inaudibly and John chuckled hotly.

“I know… I want to see you like it. Want to see your face when you like it,” he grunted, and Sherlock reached down towards John’s open suitcase on the floor and grabbed the bottle of lube that was lying in the middle.

Sherlock lathered his hands and set to work on John’s erection, massaging his fingers around the head, stroking wetly to the base and squeezing his balls for good measure. John’s face contorted in pleasure as he did this, gasping at the pressure, his hips threatening to buck at every moment.

Sherlock stopped when he was done with John and shifted back slightly, gesturing as if to give the bottle to John.

“Will you-“

“-no,” John gently pushed the bottle back towards Sherlock and he enjoyed the look of heated confusion on his face, “I want you to finger yourself in front of me,” he whispered. Sherlock’s mouth hung open in surprise and John used the tips of his fingers to trace lines across the head of Sherlock’s erection absently.

“Go on then,” he coaxed, and Sherlock groaned pleasantly before shifting back onto his elbows and working more of the lube into his fingers. He tried to push his legs back but ended up rolling back too far, until John shifted himself so that he was holding Sherlock’s legs back for him. The sight of John biting his lip in anticipation of it was enough to send Sherlock over the edge, but he calmed himself down and reached down towards himself, pushing a finger inside. Slowly he moved it around, opening himself up, letting his head loll back slightly as he did so, enjoying the sighs of pleasure he heard from John, feeling the grip on his thighs tighten and loosen occasionally. He was turning John on as much as he was turning himself on and it made it all so much more fucking _good_.

When Sherlock was done with himself John pushed himself back and Sherlock positioned his hips just below John’s. He was watching the shorter man’s face, and at the moment his eyes were dark with passion and his tongue was flicking across his lower lip, his teeth clenching down on his lips too to stifle moans. Sherlock wished he wouldn’t do that. The sound of John giving into pleasure was a sound he never wanted to cease hearing.

“Are you ready?” Sherlock asked timidly, and John smiled coolly back, placing a hand on Sherlock’s waist to show that he definitely was.

Sherlock pushed himself onto his knees and positioned himself over John’s dick, and, not without looking directly into his dark eyes, he pushed himself down. He knew that John had wanted to do it this way to see Sherlock’s face, but Sherlock knew that John’s face was so much better to behold: the way his eyebrows and jawline relaxed, the way his throat clenched and unclenched as he breathed in deep, the way his eyelids threatened to flutter closed but refused because John so wanted to see Sherlock fuck himself.

“You like that?” Sherlock asked hotly as he began to pull up and down in a rhythm, enjoying the uncontrolled bursts of sound that were escaping John’s lips. John couldn’t do anything but nod, so overwhelmed by his senses: the sight of Sherlock, the feeling of Sherlock’s tight heat surrounding his cock, the smell of heat and sweat and sex. Sherlock began to lean forward, causing a whole new sensation for John as Sherlock’s muscles began to clench around him tightly.

“Let me hear you,” Sherlock grunted, beginning to push harder, hitting his prostate, pushing faster, his thighs tensing and relaxing as he pushed himself up and down on John’s dick. John erupted in sound: his mouth fell open and he moaned loudly, his voice becoming highly pitched and desperate, his hands twisted in the sheets as he clenched his eyes shut in pleasure.

“Oh fuck, Sherlock- please, fuck, yes-“ he gasped and gasped, his hips rising as his back arched as he came closer and closer and closer until he was screaming Sherlock’s name into the pillow next to his head, his climax exploding inside of him, all of his nerves seeming to spasm at once until he was panting on the bed. Sherlock pulled himself off of John, but was still visibly aroused, his hands timidly stroking himself. John’s muscles screamed as he pushed himself up, and he let himself fall back on top of Sherlock, his mouth enveloping him completely, sucking and swirling his tongue, hollowing his cheeks until Sherlock’s hips were moving almost as if to fuck John’s mouth and his legs were wide enough for John’s whole body to fit between them.

“John, fuck, close-“ Sherlock gasped and his head fell with a crack into the headboard but he didn’t care, he was coming, he was seeing black and the room around him had turned to white noise. When he was spent John collapsed to his side and began to stroke the tender skin of Sherlock’s stomach. They lay there for a few minutes, enjoying the feeling of the comfortable heat that had settled between them. After a while, John shifted so that he could see Sherlock better.

“Sherlock?”

“Hm?”

“I don’t think I love you.”

Sherlock tensed, his body suddenly exposed, his dazed calm suddenly cracking as he realised what John had said.

“Oh, well, right, um,” Sherlock mumbled, wanting nothing but to sink down into the sheets of the bed and never come up again. Of course John didn’t love him, of course! He never had! This was just experimentation: John needed a close friend to learn with, to explore with. Why couldn’t Sherlock be the friend John needed? Why was he being so selfish? Why could he feel tears pricking at his eyes?

“Sherlock, let me finish.” John sat up in front of him and Sherlock’s breathing began to quicken as his previous anxieties started to swirl in his chest, his heart pumping faster than he’d ever felt before-

“I don’t think I love you _yet_. But I am more than fucking willing to wait and see.”

Sherlock’s heart exploded, a tear escaping his eye as his emotions ran rampant in his mind, his confused body not knowing what to do.

“You mean, you- I, I don’t- what do you-“

“-I’m saying that I can’t wait to fall in love with you.” John traced his finger across Sherlock’s defined jawline, using his thumb to blot the tear that had fallen from his wide eye.

They kissed, and Sherlock knew that he never wanted to kiss a different person in his life.

 

The End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Eee, it's finished! I wanna thank everyone that's read and given kudos and everything along the way and I just really hope you all like it, I love you all and I can't thank you enough.
> 
> I made a fanmix for this fic which is [here](http://8tracks.com/madismadismad/in-paris-with-you-johnlock)  
> If you could give it a listen it would be fantastic and hopefully you like that, too!


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